[ACML] Turmoil at Anime Expo

[Sam Chen]

I guess this is where I part ways from the file and rank on non-profit
management.

Non-profits, especially our breed, are unique. The one thing that they most
commonly lack? Business sense. It's easy to step back and say, "Well AX
needs to remember it's a non-profit." Sure it is, but with 40,000 attendees,
you aren't talking chump change anymore.

Corporations do have the lever of compensation they can pull with their
employees. But larger corporations often have a more thorough process in
dealing with employment issues, a HR department for example. At a con, if
you don't jive well with your department head, you're out of luck. You can't
necessary just fire people in a company (specifically it's not the first
option), EVEN in an at-will employment state. Think of the environment at a
con, if I'm your manager and you mouth off at me, I can take your badge and
show you the door without having another thought.

Think about your traditional non-profit, you raise a lot of money through
donations and charity, and the rest of your business is a real business, you
have employees who get paid, you spend lots of money getting your work done,
the only difference is you may not charge the same amount (if anything) for
your services.

The convention non-profit work is really like a mini-theme park run with
free labor. You raise your "donations" by selling tickets to the con. The
only difference is you don't have a shareholder to answer to. Con's still
try to get year over year growth, they still try to pocket some cash for a
rainy day.

Is putting someone from the "real world of business" into a CEO position
like this the best idea? Maybe not. But it really depends on the individual
and not some general rule of thumb. How many of your cons are run by someone
who doesn't have a day job? Someone who doesn't work in a corporate
environment of some kind? I'd say it's few and far between... My greatest
assets with regards management come from my corporate work experience. My
understanding of cash flow and budgeting come from the fact that I forecast
and budgeted for a Fortune 10 company. But my greatest understanding of
motivation and leadership come from my con experience. It's about the
synergy of the two environments.

Thanks,
Sam Chen
Anime Central

On Tue, Jan 12, 2010 at 11:37 PM, Ryan L. Kopf <kopf1988 at gmail.com> wrote:

> I absolutely agree with that. There are lots of areas of business school
> focused on nonprofit management. It's in few ways the same as corporate
> management. In a corporation you can run things anyway you want, and as
> long
> as you pay your employees they will likely stay. Working with volunteers
> takes a lot of finesse that you would probably never see in the corporate
> world.
>
> -Ryan L. Kopf
> UpcomingCons.com
>
> On Tue, Jan 12, 2010 at 10:20 PM, Trisha Lynn <trishalynn at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > >From what I've heard, they don't want to *burn* AX, they want to
> > improve things, still care about the thousands of people who come each
> > year, and don't want things to be screwed up indefinitely.
> >
> > My take on the whole situation is that in trying to take AX to the
> > next level of conventioneering, they chose someone they thought could
> > do that job.  However, throwing someone who's in the for-profit world
> > and having them run a non-profit with those sensibilities was just a
> > bad idea to begin with.
> >
> > >From my armchair, I think that they perhaps would have been served
> > better by hiring someone from a medium-sized non-profit, regardless of
> > background.
> >
>